


Non Nobis Solum

by Aashyma



Category: Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch
Genre: Canonical Character Death, M/M, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-07
Updated: 2015-07-07
Packaged: 2018-04-08 05:51:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 750
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4293168
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aashyma/pseuds/Aashyma
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There is a blizzard and Thomas isn't coping well.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Non Nobis Solum

 

He couldn't remember how long they'd been walking, slowly,painfully pushing their way through a blizzard that wasn't natural. If he wasn't so tired, he's sure he'd know what was causing it but right now it's all he can do to place one foot in front of the other, to keep pushing through the cold and the pain and the dark, not for his sake but for duty's.

In some ways, it's like he's stepped back in time seventy years, to when he had walked out of the hospital to find his life in pieces, his friends dead.

David dead.

David with his wicked laugh and his mercurial moods, David who had a new theory for every day of the week and a new project every month. David who never despaired in his unending quest to unmake the world just so he could see how it worked. David who took such joy in the strangest things, like saying his name.

_Thomas, don't be upset but I've papered the living room in Einstein's string theory. Thomas meet my new familiar,Schrödinger. Yes Thomas I know he's a dog but cats are for witches. Thomas, when you said we were going to spend the weekend on wands, I had a very different activity in mind._

Sometimes, he'd just purr it out of the blue, while they were reading together or In the middle of the night, _Thomas,_ in a wondering tone,like a man who'd inherited a fortune from a stranger,as though he, David, had been the lucky one.

And the last time he'd said his name.

_I'm not leaving you,Thomas._

But he had, because he-Thomas-had insisted.

And his bright, beautiful, shining David had locked himself in with the work he loved so much ( _But not more than you, Thomas, so don't be jealous_ ) and blown his brains out.

He hadn't raged or wept or followed David. He had his duty to keep him and to numb him.

They'd buried the gun with him.

_Closed casket to spare the mother. You understand Nightingale._

They'd given his things away by the time he found out. Everything he loved had been returned to his family. Everything except the work he'd lived and died for.

They'd left him the best and worst of David.

He stumbles and sinks to his knees, his breath hitching as his sweat (It had to be sweat,he mustn't cry in front of his apprentice) froze on his face.He's warm, despite the snow, despite the ice sticking to his lashes and the wind howling.

Absently he starts pulling at his scarf ( _Why is he so warm_ ) until someone-Peter-pulls his hands away.

“With all due respect sir, we need to keep moving before -”

He vaguely registers the crude joke and the light, coaxing tone as his apprentice tries to lift him to his feet, dragging one arm across his own shoulders and gently tugging on the other

“Just a little longer sir, we just need to find some shelter and then we can make a fire. You could even teach me some Boy Scout songs to pass the time. Or we could exchange scary stories, I hear that's an old favourite too..”

“I can’t.. Peter. I’ll wait.. slowing you down.. ” His voice is barely a whimper and he can almost feel the weight of Peter's disappointment but he doesn't care any more,he's carried the weight for seventy years alone and he's bone weary. All he wants is to lie down and sleep.

There’s a long silence and he thinks Peter too has left him.

Then he feels gloved hands on his face, and Peter’s breath against his ear, whispered because even Peter is tired.

“I’m not going to leave you, Thomas. ”

It’s the way he says his name- _Thomas-_ with such sweet fervour,so earnest and yet so gentle, so like yet so unlike the man he has never stopped mourning that has him clinging to Peter-bold,incandescent Peter, who won't desert him, even if it meant dying next to him, who had so much to give and learn and live for- and dragging himself to his feet

He will later insist to himself that he only got up because he realised the boy would have perished with him if he didn't, that any other feelings were caused by that he had done it, once again for duty but right now, he carries that single word ( _Thomas)_ like an ember against the dark and keeps pushing on.

 

**Author's Note:**

> The title is a latin motto: Not for ourselves alone.  
> The fic is an expansion of a prompt I did on tumblr: Something I said you weren't meant to hear.  
> Yes I did woefully misunderstand it.
> 
> First fic and I'd love some critiques!


End file.
